


Fridays

by 09cityskylights



Category: Shameless (US), gallavich - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe - Childhood Friends, Childhood, Cute Friendship Story, Growing Up, Halloween, Little Ian, Little Mickey, Paper Boy Ian, Trick or Treating, lonely mickey
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-10-29
Updated: 2018-01-16
Packaged: 2019-01-25 22:33:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 16,692
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12542724
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/09cityskylights/pseuds/09cityskylights
Summary: Mickey Milkovich is a very lonely little kid growing up in the tougher side of Chicago, but one day his neighborhood gets a new paper boy around his age that he is just fascinated by.





	1. 'Fridays'

**Author's Note:**

> Mickey is 5 years old in the beginning, and 6 later on. Ian is 4 years old, and then 5.

**September, 2000**

Crouched beside a small pile of overturned dark brown earth in the backyard that really is starting to resemble a miniature junkyard due to Terry Milkovich’s habit of collecting things he never actually repairs, a young Mickey Milkovich makes sputtering noises through his pink lips as he forces his broken yellow dump truck toy through the dirt, loving the actual tracks it leaves.

He searches around himself in the yard for the other car he has, a little Hot Wheels he got for his birthday last year, a 1999 Red Rageous, and places it in the dirt, making a crashing sound as the dump truck “picks it up” and drops it into a pile of dirt again. 

Smiling at his little made-up game, he hears a thump sound and turns around with a curious frown, resting his small hands on the knees of dirt and grass stained jeans.

Oh. It’s a cat.

Mickey gets up from his yellow dump truck and special car, immediately forgetting about his made-up game as he spots the neighbor’s black outdoor cat poking its way around the yard, probably looking for mice among all the broken garbage cluttering the cramped yard.

“Here kitty!” Mickey calls out, but the cat ignores him, jumping onto an old white plastic yard chair and swishing its kinked tail as he tries to approach. It seems scared. But he wants to pet it.

He knows cats like fish, that’s been in every story he’s ever heard, so he runs inside his house, the flimsy back door loudly banging shut behind himself as he pulls himself up onto the worn linoleum counter to steal a can of no-name tuna from the cupboards above.

It takes him a few clumsy moments with the can opener in his small hands before he can slice it open, but he runs outside with the open can eagerly, his pale cheeks flushed from eagerness as he puts it down on the grass for the cat. It sniffs the air, whiskers twitching before it jumps down to eat from the can, Mickey waiting and watching it eat happily.

When the tuna can is almost empty, he reaches over to pick the cat up around it’s middle so he can hold it, like you are ‘sposed to hold pets. But the cat hisses and growls at him, scraping its sharp nails across his thin fall jacket until they gain purchase and tear through the blue material to his skin.

He lets out a cry and drops the angry cat, blood seeping through the fresh scratch marks in tiny little red beads while his eyes water in pain. He picks up the empty can of tuna and throws it after the fussy cat, taking off into the house and running to his mother in the living room to show her his arms.

“Mama” he whimpers, and Anastasiya Milkovich, barely an adult herself, looks up at him through tired blue eyes. “Oh” she says, and without another word she leads him to the downstairs bathroom to clean up his scrapes, methodically and robotically.

Like she knows what to do, but has no feeling behind it.

**November, 2000**

Mickey sits on the back steps in the backyard and watches the black cat eat from the half-empty can of tuna quietly. He eventually learned, after a few more tries, that the cat would take food from him, but he couldn’t touch it.

It didn’t like that.

He manages to steal a can or two a week from the cupboards without anyone noticing, and he always chucks the empty cans into the pile of junk in the backyard so his Dad won’t find them. He knows he’d get beat if he did. Say he was wasting food.

It was still worth the risk to him though. Mandy was no fun to play with. She wasn’t much younger than him, but she was screechy and annoying and wouldn’t play any of the games _he_ wanted to. And his other brothers lived with their moms, so they usually just beat him up or picked on him when they came over.

Cept for Iggy. Sometimes Iggy would play with him. But that was only once a month when him and his Mama came over, and Mickey was lonely the rest of the time.

When the cat is done eating the tuna it leaves, and Mickey heaves a bored sigh, picking up his old broken dump truck and wandering around the side of the house slowly, swinging it at his side. He thinks he can find some pebbles in the street to put the back of it, pretend he is making a construction site.

He freezes when he hears a little boy’s voice though, an unfamiliar one, drifting towards him from the front yard.

“No I can do it by myself!”

Dropping to his hands and knees, Mickey crawls over to peek around the side of the Milkovich house, spying from his place in the hard dirt behind some full bushes that turned brown and brittle in the cold weather, but didn’t shed their tiny leaves.

The voice came from a little boy stomping up the walkway to Mickey’s house, carrying a fat newspaper in his hands. His hair is bright, _bright_ , red, and he’s covered in freckles, and he looks determined but happy.

He throws the paper onto the porch importantly and calls out, “See?” to the other boy waiting at the side of the road.

“I already told Fiona you can do your paper route on your own, but she thinks you’re too much of a baby” the boy sneers, but he’s not really sounding mean, more like he’s having fun, and the redhead boy sticks out his tongue back at him.

“Shut up Lip”.

From his spying place, Mickey watches them walk down the road together to the next house, and the next, until he can’t see them anymore. He gets up and barely brushes himself off of the dirt clinging to his clothes before he runs to the porch, picking up the newspaper in his cold hands.

It’s the Chicago _Friday Star_ , a free paper that comes once a week.

That must be the new paper boy.

**January 2001**

Mickey stands on his tip toes to get a look at the flashing green digital clock on the stove. He sees 3…1, and 8.

3:18 PM.

He rushes to pull on winter boots and the thin coat that used to be Iggy’s, remembering a scarf and his stupid itchy hat too, but forgetting to put on his blue polar gloves in his hurry to get outside.

Dashing around the side of the house, he ducks down behind the fluffy hill of snow he carefully piled up to hide behind the week before, when he realized the dying bushes wouldn’t keep him out of view anymore.

He waits quietly for them to appear, his breath showing like clouds in the cold winter air and his little fingers growing stiff as they rest against the crusty white snow. But he doesn’t care about that.

Sure enough, within ten minutes or so he sees the two boys come traipsing up to the house, the redhead alone going up the walkway just like always to throw the paper onto the porch with satisfaction before he goes back to his brother.

Today, like every other day, Mickey watches the two of them leave with bated breath, never once revealing that he was there.

And as soon as they are gone, he runs up to the porch and takes the newspaper, so its his before its his Dad’s to spill coffee or beer on.

**February 2001**

“What time is it Mama?”

No answer.

“What time is it Mama!” Mickey demands a little more loudly, tugging at his mother’s sweater impatiently. She sighs and looks at her old-style watch, “It’s three twenty-one” she informs him.

“No!” he shouts, stomping his boot on the ice. He was mad. Today their old car was broken, so Mama was late getting them from elementary school and they had to _walk_ home.

Today it was a Friday.

“Mikhalio, don’t you dare run ahead of me” she warns, and Mickey pauses before he takes off, knowing that when her voice gets like that, she means it.

That’s when she tells Dad what he did. And that’s when he gets a whupping.

Mandy glares at him from her place beside Mama, still holding her Mother’s hand when they walked together. But he’s a big boy, and he doesn’t do that anymore.

Big boy. He wants to scream but instead he tries to explain, “I need to be home _now_ Mama”.

“No, you don’t” she argues back, and Mickey’s small dark eyebrows come together and he does what Mama and Dad do when they are upset at each other. He sticks up his finger at her. 

“That’s the wrong finger and if you ever do that again, I’ll hit you myself” she growls. But she didn’t even need to say that. She didn’t need to say anything, because Mickey is frozen now.

Standing absolutely still, he watches with an open mouth as the redhead paper boy and his brother walk up the same road, just across the street, the older brother carrying the bag of papers like he usually does, the younger one running up to each house with a precious newspaper.

Wordlessly, his mother grabs at his hand and Mickey is so awestruck he doesn’t even fight it, just allows himself to be led away down the street and towards the convenience store where Mama says she wants to get milk and Wonder bread.

When they get home, he sees the newspaper waiting on the steps, and he runs to pick it up, hugging it to his chest as his mother unlocks the front door to let them inside.

**May 2001**

It’s summer time when Mickey finally learns the boys name.

He’s sitting behind the bushes at the side of the house, and it’s a hot Friday, a very hot Friday, so his Mama let him and Mandy have 99 cent popsicles.

His popsicle is electric blue, and dripping blue drops down his arms as he licks at it slowly, trying to make it last. He’s sweating a bit even though he cut the sleeves off his shirt with scissors to cool down, like his brother Iggy does.  

He smiles to himself as the two boys appear at the end of the walkway, and he notices the redhead boy got a haircut. His hair is short, like Mickey’s now, and he touches his head absentmindedly, feeling the spikiness of his own black hair as the boy comes up the walkway.

The boy throws the paper up the porch, but instead of leaving right away like he always does, he stops and crouches beside the red Rageous Hot Wheels Mickey had left on the porch steps, picking it up in his small hand to look at it.

“Ian, that’s not yours” the older boy calls out towards him, and the redhead boy frowns.

“I’m not stealing it I’m looking at it”.

Ian. His name is Ian. Mickey’s forgotten popsicle melts even more, dripping forgotten into the dirt and grass as he watches in great interest while the kid smiles at the special car before putting it back.

This time when they leave down the street, Mickey runs for his toy car first, smiling as he turns it in his hands.

Part of him wishes the boy took it.

**June 2001**

“Okay class, I want you to fill in the worksheets I gave you. You need to tell me about a friend. Write their name, and tell me something about them. Then in the box, draw a picture of your friend! Let me know if you need help spelling anything”.

Mickey listens intently as his teacher Mrs. Devonne talks, and while all the other kids in his class at the worst elementary school in the South Side start scribbling with their broken crayons, he pauses.

He doesn’t really have a _real_ friend.

Except…he feels like Ian could be his friend. His tongue sticking out slightly while he works so seriously that he almost has a frown, Mickey writes:

 _My frend is Ian. Ian brings me the news papper_.

Then he draws a picture of Ian in the box.

He feels sad because he only has blue, no orange for the hair. So he turns to another boy at his table, “I need your orange”.

“No” Derek promptly ignores him and goes back to scribbling on his own worksheet.

“Gimme it” Mickey demands, standing up and pushing his small plastic chair back with a scrape. Derek still says no. Mickey grabs the crayon away from him and colors in the hair orange like its supposed to be while Derek cries like a big baby.

He gets sent home early and Dad is very angry about that.

**July-August 2001**

Summer is hard.

Mickey doesn’t have school and he is around his Dad a lot more than he wants to be.

Fridays feel very far away, and because school is out, Ian and his brother deliver the papers whenever they feel like it, so Mickey only saw them two Fridays out of the entire summer.

His dad finds out about the tuna cans and the black cat stops coming around.

**September 2001**

Mickey is thrilled when school comes back. Not because he’s in grade one now though.

He waits in his special place beside the Milkovich house after school on the first Friday of the year, and he’s surprised but happy to see that only Ian comes this time, carrying the big bag of newspapers by himself all the way up the house, and reaching inside to pick one out to throw at the porch.

Mickey wants so badly to say hi to him. He almost does. Almost says, “Hi Ian”.

But he doesn’t.  

**October 31 st 2001**

Today is a Friday, but it’s not a good Friday.

Mickey’s Mama tells him when she picks him up from elementary that he is switching schools next week, to a new one because he gets in trouble too much at the one he’s at now, and his teacher doesn’t want to put up with him anymore, and neither do they.

Its also Halloween, and Mickey’s Dad tells him that he can’t go out this year. They don’t have money for two costumes. He has to stay home by himself, while Dad and Mama take Mandy over to trick or treat where his Aunt Lily lives.

Mickey loves candy. Today is not a good Friday.

He waits at his normal place for Ian to deliver the newspaper, feeling very sorry for himself until he sees the redhead come up the road and towards his house. He’s wearing a white outfit today for Halloween, with silver and blue things on it, and Mickey stares at him in disbelief.

Ian’s struggling to carry both a helmet that’s spray-painted white, and his bag full of heavy newspapers, and when he’s going up the porch steps towards Mickey’s house he trips, dropping everything he’s carrying and grabbing at his right knee as he cries out in pain.

And just like that, without even thinking about it, Mickey shoots up from his hiding place, coming around the corner cautiously as the other boy gets up from the steps, his face still screwed up a little as he picks everything up in annoyance.

“Are…” Mickey’s voice cracks, and as Ian turns around to look at him for the very first time, he doesn’t know how to speak all of a sudden.

Ian blinks, and then looks down at his white and blue sneakers, reddening a bit. “I tripped”.

“Are you okay?” Mickey finally stammers out, and the redhead boy nods, “Yeah. My stupid helmet and these newspapers were all jumbly in my arms and I just fell. I’m okay though”.

Mickey nods back, finding it hard to believe they are finally talking. “Are you…are you an astronaut?” he asks shyly, and Ian’s face immediately splits into a toothy smile.

“Yes! Nobody knew what I was all day!”

“I did” Mickey says happily, and then he remembers. “Do you want to play cars with me?” He points at the special Hot Wheels that he had often left on the porch after Ian admired it just that one time, so many months ago.

Ian looks sorely tempted, his hand reaching towards it before he even says yes. “Just for a minute. I have to deliver my papers. I have a big boy job like my brother Lip”.

Mickey grins, scrambling up to sit on the old porch beside Ian while they push the car around for a little bit, and Ian tells him how he likes to collect HotWheels too, but his brother Lip hides them when he gets mad at him.

But all too soon, Ian is getting up and brushing off his knees, “I have to go. Thanks for letting me play with your Hot Wheels”.

No! Mickey doesn’t want him to go! “Wait…I can…I can help you with your papers Ian” he offers quickly.

Ian looks confused, “How do you know my name?”

“I…heard your brother call you that before” Mickey admits, a little sheepishly. “But I never saw you before though. You should have said hi to me so I’d see you” Ian says, all freckles and friendliness.

“Yeah. I should have” Mickey agrees, “Can I help?” He reaches out for the bag of papers, and Ian slowly hands it over, both of them still smiling as they head down the walkway together to the next house on Ian’s paper route.

“So what’s your name?” Ian asks, showing him how to toss the paper to the porch. Mickey copies him, thrilled when it lands exactly where it was supposed to from several feet away.

“Mickey”.

“I like that name”.

They talk excitedly all through the rest of the route, and Mickey feels the bag of newspapers getting lighter and lighter, and when they reach the end of the bag, Ian points at a blue and white house down the street. “I live there”.

“Oh” Mickey says, a little sadly. He doesn’t want to go home. Doesn’t want to say goodbye to Ian. But he has nothing else to help him with now.

The redhead doesn’t leave right away though. He looks at Mickey for a long moment before he suddenly smiles like he just thought of something, “Do you want to come over? We can go trick or treating together after dinner” Ian asks, getting visibly excited as the idea forms in his head.

“I…I don’t have a costume” Mickey admits, still sad.

Ian doesn’t seem phased in the slightest, “You can borrow! I was a firefighter last year and Debbie is just a baby so she doesn’t need a costume!”

Mickey smiles, his own grin growing bigger as Ian grins back and jumps up and down, “Come on!” Then the other boy grabs his hand and without another word runs down the street towards his white and blue house, dragging Mickey along with him, who can’t remember ever feeling happier.

The house Ian brings him into is nicer than any one Mickey thinks he’s ever been in. It’s not dark like his is… its colorful. And warm, and it feels _happy_ inside. It’s messy, but not like his house is messy. His house is messy because nobody cares. This house is messy because it’s full of life.

“Fiona!” Ian hollers out as soon as they step inside the living, and Mickey feels a little shy again as a pretty girl that looks about twelve comes over, glancing towards the stranger her little brother still has by the hand.

“This is my friend Mickey. Can he stay for dinner? We’re going to go treating together” Ian says promptly.

_My friend Mickey._

_My friend Ian._

Fiona shrugs, “Sure. You okay with ham and cheese sandwiches Mickey? Mom’s not feeling good, so I’m making dinner”.

“Yes” Mickey nods happily. He is more than okay with that.

Mickey sits at the table beside Ian, swinging his legs as his new, real, friend talks to him happily, chattering about all sorts of things while he listens intently, thinking about how different it is from his house. Nobody talks at the table at his house.

After dinner, Fiona finds Ian’s fireman costume from last year, and Mickey pulls on the yellow plastic jacket over his clothes eagerly, grinning as Ian plunks the helmet over his head and gives him a thumbs up.

For the first year ever, he leaves as part of a group of kids to go trick or treating, and even Lip and Fiona talk to him, like he’s their friend too. Lip is a skeleton for Halloween, but he didn’t paint his face. Fiona dresses as Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz, and she carries baby Debbie with them Trick or Treating because their Mama doesn’t feel good.

Ian whispers to him he thinks their Mama is going to have another baby. She looks like she’s getting fat again, and she cries a lot. Mickey doesn’t know what to say to that, so he just nods and says, “My Mama said she doesn’t want no more babies”.

His new friend nods sagely.

Trick or treating with Ian and his brother and sisters might be one of the most fun nights Mickey has ever had. Ian takes his hand a lot when he gets excited, and they run through the streets laughing and playing, pushing each other into piles of autumn leaves whenever they find them.

One time a big teenager walking past in a scary costume jumps and yells at Ian to scare him, so Mickey runs up and kicks him in the shin until the big kid backs off and says sorry to Ian.

Finally, their pillow cases are getting heavy and baby Debbie starts to fuss and whine, so Fiona says its time to head home. She lets Mickey come inside again and count his candy with them, but then she asks, “Will your parents be mad you aren’t home? It’s getting a little late”.

His jaw is sticky from the toffee he just crammed into his mouth but Mickey manages to answer anyways, “No. They don’t care”.

“Oh”. The young girl looks at him for a moment longer, “How did you meet Ian?”

“He delivers my paper” Mickey says, and Ian smiles over at him, nodding his head in agreement as he dumps smarties into his mouth, “Smarties are my favorite” Ian informs him rather seriously.

Mickey likes Smarties too. “I thought maybe you went to school together” Fiona says, rolling her eyes as Lip spits out a mint and frowns, “Who the hell gives out mints!”

Mickey collects all his boxes of Smarties and gives them to Ian, shaking his head at Ian’s older sister a little sadly, “No. I go to Harvey Public School but I have to switch to Oak Elementary on Monday”.

Ian immediately turns to him then, resting a sticky hand on Mickey’s again as his green eyes flash with excitement.

“That’s my school Mickey! I go to Oak Elementary!”

Mickey smiles at Ian as he watches him look over at Fiona happily, thinking her brother just found his new best friend.  

This was a very, very good Friday.


	2. Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Summary: A continuation of the original story ‘Fridays’ in which a very lonely little boy named Mickey Milkovich, growing up in the rougher side of Chicago, eventually becomes friends with the friendly paper boy in his neighborhood. The continuation will span over their following years, where Ian continues to be a source of comfort and friendship for Mickey as they grow up, and eventually something more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Notes* Mickey and Ian are less than a year apart in this, only about six months. Lip is a year and half older. Monica and Frank are still iffy parents but not always bad. The Milkovich house layout is different than in the show, they have an upstairs with the bedrooms.

**PART 2 (6 months later- still five and six)**

**April, 2002**

Mickey cringes in his uneven seat at the dinner table, waiting for the harsh smack upside the head he expects after he drops his heavy metal fork by accident and it clangs jarringly against the cheap kitchen table, making Terry jump.

“Dammit Mikhailo!” he snarls.

Mickey yelps but doesn’t cry as he receives a stinging backhand to his pale and chubby right cheek, choosing to sniff back his tears instead. He’s a big boy. He’s not supposed to cry.

When his Dad starts eating again, satisfied with his quiet response, Mickey picks up his own heavy utensil again more carefully, lifting another forkful of microwaved macaroni and cheese into his mouth as his small hand shakes a little.

Lots of stray macaronis fall back down onto his chipped plate, but he scoops them up again eagerly to put back into his mouth. He’s still hungry.

He’s always hungry, because he’s a growing boy.

“Finish up Mickey” Mama says wearily, as she gets up to put the rest of the dirty and mismatched dinner plates into their already overcrowded and dimly-lit kitchen sink. Her long black hair is tied back, but its still frizzy from the chilled dampness of the house, and she looks a little tired. “I want to be back home before its dark out”.

Mickey nods. He’s eager to leave, because tonight he has a sleepover at the Gallagher’s house. He never had any sleepovers before he met Ian. He wasn’t even sure what they were at first.

But now he loves them, and sometimes on Fridays he’s allowed to stay over when Mrs. Gallagher tells Ian and Lip he can.  

Mickey’s allowed to eat snacks when he’s hungry at the Gallagher’s house, and they all talk to him and play with him, and the boy’s room is warm at night too. But best of all, Ian’s there.

Lip’s his friend too, but Ian’s his _best_ friend. He has been ever since Halloween.

“He’s too damn old to have his mother walking him around like a baby” Terry Milkovich growls as he lights a pungent cigarette, still sitting at the dinner table. Coughing and hacking after his first phlegmy inhale, the grey smoke he exhales drifts over towards Mickey’s face, who scrunches his little nose at the harsh smell.

“He’s only seven Terry” Anastasiya Milkovich answers quietly.

There’s a moment of almost pure silence where both Mickey and his pale and worn out looking Mother wait worriedly to see if that was a stupid thing to say, while Mandy just plays with her doll. Stupid things to say make his Dad angry, but Mandy doesn’t really know that yet.

Pausing at the kitchen sink to grip the edge of it as if she needs support just to stand there, Anastasiya’s silver wedding band clinks against the metal, barely holding its place on her narrow ring finger as she waits.

“Whatever. Take the other one with you too” Terry finally mutters, sliding Mickey’s now empty plate towards himself to use a makeshift ashtray, “And Ana? Pick up a six-pack on your way home. None of that light crap”.

After carefully but hastily pushing in his chair, Mickey runs to grab his small backpack at the doorway and pull on his running shoes, jamming a red and white baseball cap over his dark hair last while his mother quietly gets herself and Mandy ready beside him.

He sings to himself the entire two block walk to the Gallagher’s, his often-silent mother never saying a word, but Mandy makes up her own words to sing along with him too, and he doesn’t mind that. The sight of the blue and white house coming up in the distance always makes him feel happy, and he sings more cheerfully right up until the door, where he shuffles in place impatiently after his loud knock.

Mrs. Gallagher, Monica, is standing there when it opens. She has her new baby on her hip, Carl. Ian had been right last Halloween. His mama was pregnant, and Carl was a big and loud baby. Mickey didn’t like babies all that much.

“Oh, hi Anastasiya” Monica says, her voice sounding a little funny. Mickey squints up at her, wondering where Ian and Lip are.

“You can still take Mickey tonight, right?” his Mama asks, sounding worried all of a sudden. She lights a thin cigarette, and it trembles between her pale fingers as she brings it to her lips, Mandy already gone from her side and kicking at pebbles by the end of the walkway.

“Oh yes, the boys can’t wait to see him. When should we bring him back around tomorrow?” Monica asks, smiling down at Mickey like she’s excited to see him.

“I honestly don’t care. I’ll be around” his Mama answers, quickly adding a murmured, “Thanks”. And with that, she turns and walks down the steps. Mickey silently watches her leave; watches Mandy skip to catch up with her.  

“She forgot to say goodbye” Monica says after a while in her singsong voice, waving at his Mama’s long-gone back and trying to get him to do the same, “Goodbye Anastasiya”.

Mickey doesn’t want to. His Mama never says goodbye to him so why should he? Sometimes Mrs. Gallagher is kind of weird. Nice, but weird.

Mickey follows her inside the warm Gallagher house and kicks his shoes off into the tray with all the others, hurrying up the stairs to the boy’s room like he usually does. He finds Ian and Lip sitting on the floor around a great big pile of Legos, digging through the pieces and snapping at each other for the best ones, but both of them stop fighting when they see him standing there.

He gives a toothy grin that matches their own, “Hi guys” he breathes out, plunking himself down on the fraying carpet between them and gazing at the Lego with jealous blue eyes.

“We’re making houses” Lip tells him, showing him the blocky structure he’s making.

Mickey’s impressed. It looks really good. “Can I help?” he asks hopefully. He doesn’t have anywhere near this much Lego at his house. His fits into two sandwich containers.

Lip hesitates, but Ian immediately pushes his board towards him to share, and together they build three little houses and even a cool Lego car that they pretend to smash into Lip’s one big house, who quickly tells them they are both being annoying, and that he’s bored now.

Soon after they are done playing with the Lego, Fiona comes in and tells them to do their homework anyways. Mickey of course brought his too.

At the Gallagher house, he always had to do his homework. But he doesn’t mind. He’s in Ian’s class, so they have the same problems worksheet, and they share answers to their math questions while Lip does his own homework with bigger numbers a lot faster. Ian says his big brother is really smart.

Mickey believes him.

He didn’t have his own toothbrush the first time he spent the night at the Gallagher house, but the second time he had a sleepover Fiona gave him a brand-new red one just for him, and now that one stays here, jammed in a plastic cup with all the other toothbrushes.

When they get ready for bed that night, he shares the sink with Ian, both of them spitting at the drain at same time and then making foamy smiles and growly faces at each other in the dirty bathroom mirror until Fiona tells them they are being gross.

Mickey puts on his worn-out Spiderman pajamas that he is getting too big for after, and sits up in Ian’s bed with him while Fiona reads a pirate story to them all before the lights go out. He loves hearing the bedtime stories she reads because he’s only ever heard them at school before, and he listens with rapt attention, even though Lip has been starting to lose interest in story time over the past couple months.

When the pirate story is over, Fiona tells Ian and Mickey to both get under the covers and go to sleep. Mickey always shares Ian’s bed when he sleeps over, because Lip is older than them, so he doesn’t have to share.  

Ian’s covers are soft and warm anyways, and Mickey likes sleeping there, even when Ian snuffles beside his face or kicks at him while he’s sleeping. Mickey usually just smiles into his pillow when the sound or motion wakes him up, and then goes back to sleep again.

“Your feet are cold” he giggles when one stray one touches him underneath the covers, Ian grinning as he pushes his own against Mickey’s feet even more. Monica comes into the bedroom while Fiona is still tucking Carl in with a bottle and calls out in her singsong voice like she always does, “Goodnight my beautiful babies, I love you!”

Mickey settles down against the lumpy pillow as Lip and Ian answer her like they always do, and even baby Carl gurgles in his crib. Every night that he has ever slept over, Fiona and sometimes Monica too come in and say _goodnight_ and _I love you_ to the boys.

Mickey always listens to the warm exchange quietly, not interrupting. It seems like it’s special.

Fiona gets up to leave when Monica’s gone, and she calls behind herself before she goes to check on Debbie last, “Night guys, love you”.

Without thinking, laying there in Ian’s bed sleepily, Mickey starts to answer with the other two boys as the bedroom light goes out, “ _Good_ -“

He quickly stops himself though, pulling the covers up over his mouth. “You never answered before. Why’d you stop?” Ian quickly whispers, turning to face him in the dark. Mickey can see Ian’s face a little bit because of the nightlight in the bedroom, and the worn-out teddy bear Ian likes to sleep with is clutched tightly in his arms.

“They weren’t talking to me” he answers. Ian looks at him for a minute while he plays with his teddy bear’s ear, and Mickey doesn’t know what his friend is thinking. But then Ian lets out a yawn, and before he closes his eyes, he mumbles, “Goodnight Mickey, love you”.

**June 2002**

“Put em up Mickey!” Ian shouts, making popping sounds from his mouth as he jumps out from behind the plastic slide at the park, both his hands made into finger guns.

“No, you put em up!” Mickey hollers back, running up the plastic steps of the jungle gym for higher ground. He makes popping sounds with his own finger guns, but eventually Ian stops pretending to be a cowboy too, looking up at him all cranky.

“I shot you like a hundred times” he complains, his hands now limp at his sides.

Mickey pauses for a moment and then lays on his back, making a loud gurgling sound and then going down the slide head first as he pretends to be dead. Ian laughs and laughs, running up the steps to go down the slide head first too, until they both end up in a giggling pile in the sand.

Ian lifts a finger gun and points it between Mickey’s eyes, “Pow” he giggles. Mickey sticks his tongue out, closes one blue eye and then the other, flopping down into the sand again. He pretends to be dead and silly until Ian shakes at his chest, both hands pressed down onto him as he says, “Don’t be dead Mickey. It was… a water gun!”

“Okay”. Mickey gets up again, and then he thinks of something. “Come on Ian, let’s play at my house! I want to show you something!”

Ian looks a little nervous as Mickey tugs him into his parent’s bedroom, but they aren’t home, and he knows he won’t get in trouble.

“I just want to show you” he repeats. Pulling open the bottom drawer of his dad’s dresser, the real guns hidden in there slide against the wood and each other, making a few thump sounds.

Ian inches a little closer, but doesn’t smile or laugh as he looks down into the drawer, “Are those for real?” he asks, letting out his breath in a little hush.

“Yeah!” Mickey answers, picking one up in his hand and looking at it for a moment. He’s heard real guns a lot, and he’s seen his dad shoot these ones in the backyard. But his dad doesn’t know that he knows where he hides them.

“Don’t”.

Mickey turns in surprise towards Ian, who is shaking his little red head firmly, “I don’t want you to get hurt. Put it away” he says.

Seeing the scared look on Ian’s face, Mickey quickly puts the gun away and closes the drawer, and after that Ian doesn’t want to play cowboys anymore for a long time.

**September 2002**

After months of begging his Mama, Mickey is _finally_ allowed to have Ian and Lip over for a sleepover at his house, but they have to bring their own sleeping bags with them because his bed isn’t big enough for two or three people, she says.

He cleans up his room without being asked to before they show up, and runs for the front door when the doorbell rings that night, his dad complaining from the table as he goes soaring past making whooshing airplane sounds. “Fucking freak” Terry growls.

Mickey doesn’t even register his comment.

 “Hi guys” he breathes out excitedly as Lip and Ian grin at him from behind their rolled-up sleeping bags when he opens the door to let them in, “You can put those in my room, and then we can watch a movie!” His Mama promised him he could have the TV tonight because his Dad was going out to play poker with his friends, and Mickey was excited. He’d never had even one friend for a sleepover before, now he had two!

“I brought the movie Dinosaur!” Ian tells him as they tramp up the stairs together, the three of them playfully pushing and shoving each other almost the whole way. Lip and Ian had only been to his house a couple times before, and each time they look around a little more than they did the last time, he notices.

But there are always new things to look at, Mickey guesses. There’s a big hole in his bedroom door from his dad’s boot that wasn’t there before that he pretends to spy through sometimes.

Still goofing around with each other, Lip and Ian roll out their sleeping bags on his old blue carpet and then head back downstairs with Ian’s DVD, Mickey stealing the half empty bag of chips from the kitchen cupboard for them to eat while they watch the movie.

He hasn’t seen this one before, and he really likes it. Ian loves dinosaurs, so he knows why his best friend likes it so much too, even though Lip says it’s too fake.

When they finally go upstairs to bed after the movie, they do it because they are tired, not because anyone tells them to. Mickey’s Mama is closed up in his parent’s room like she usually is at night, and Lip and Ian seem a little confused at first that no one is telling him, or them, what to do. But then they love it.

“This is great!” Ian exclaims, “We didn’t have to do homework, or brush our teeth, or do anything else!” Lip seems to happily agree, but Mickey doesn’t know what to say.

He likes it at their house better. But he’s glad they are happy here too. They stay up for a while longer talking, then eventually all fall asleep.

When Mickey wakes up again with a sudden start from a loud noise, his eyes immediately go towards his clock that’s flashing 3:47 AM, just like they always do.

A glass bottle breaking woke him up, and there’s angry shouting coming from downstairs. Dad sounds drunk again. He glances down at his floor and sees Lip and Ian are both awake, sitting up in their sleeping bags and looking scared. He tiptoes towards his bedroom door and closes it, “There” he whispers.

The sound is a little more muffled. But they still look scared as they sink back down towards their pillows, and Mickey is a little embarrassed that they don’t look happy to be here anymore.

In the morning when they all walk to school together, Ian and Lip say maybe he should just sleep over at their house from now on, because there’s more room anyways.

Mickey likes that idea a lot.


	3. Part 3

**PART 3 (Ages 6 &7)**

**Late September 2002**

Ian giggles as Mickey makes another silly face at his desk, pretending like he’s falling asleep to make his best friend laugh while one by one the students in their class are called over to sit in front of the lice people, who pick through their hair with a wooden stick.

They didn’t do that at Mickey’s old school.

But this school doesn’t have metal detectors for him to try and set off for fun either.

When it’s his turn he’s surprised to discover that the pokey stick feels pretty good scratching against his head, and he actually sits there almost quietly during his examination, even though Ian turns around and makes faces to try and make him laugh too.

The lice woman writes on a clipboard after she throws out Mickey’s hair stick and then pushes his back gently to make him walk towards the teacher.

“Oh. Come on Mickey, lets call your mother” Mrs. Kenney says, avoiding him slightly as he stops beside her in confusion. “Why? I didn’t do anything bad” he answers, looking over towards Ian for guidance, who doesn’t say anything, but looks sad for him.

“Mickey, please. We need to call your mother” his teacher impatiently insists, but she won’t tell him why, and he’s getting mad. His dad will be angry if he gets sent home early, and he didn’t even do anything wrong. It’s not fair that he’ll get in trouble for this.

“No!” he argues, walking back over to his desk. But Mrs. Kenney puts out her hand out on his defiant shoulder, and stops him from sitting back down in his seat. “Mickey, you have lice. You need to go home until its treated” she tries to say quietly, but some kids still hear.

Mickey reddens as all the kids sitting around him except for Ian start to scoff and giggle at him. More embarrassed than he can ever remember being before, he completely avoids Ian’s freckled face as he looks up, even though he knows his friend isn’t laughing at him as he turns around leaves Mrs. Kenney’s classroom, wishing he could kick something and swear instead.

He goes to sit outside the front office by himself, his red face pressed down into his pale and grubby hands, but even after an hour, his Mama still hasn’t shown up and he really has to pee.

“Mickey?”

Mickey finally hears a soft voice, and he looks up to see Mrs. Gallagher standing there and smiling at him while he looks back at her in confusion. “Your mama can’t come get you today, she asked me if I would” she tells him, “So I’m here!”

She looks very happy. “

I’m not in trouble” he tells her back, sniffing as he wipes his nose on his sleeve, “I didn’t do anything bad”. She nods, “I know honey, your mom told me. Come on, let’s get you home”.

Mickey doesn’t say anything on the walk to the Gallagher house. He’d never been there before when Ian or Lip wasn’t there too for him to play with. It’s better than going home though.

Monica talks to him the entire way, but he doesn’t feel like talking. She doesn’t yell at him for not answering though, she just sort of answers herself.

When they get inside the house and take off their fall coats, she smiles at him, but his blue eyes are starting to sting with tears as he remembers the kids at school making fun of him again.

Monica puts her hand over her chest, her voice getting soft and reassuring again. “Oh… don’t be embarrassed sweetheart. Each of my kids has had it before. It happens. It’s okay”.

Mickey sniffs in response, and puts out his hand obediently when she reaches for it encouragingly, letting her lead him upstairs and to the bathroom sink. She takes out a special shampoo that she says will kill all the yucky bugs, and he closes his eyes as she rubs it into his scalp. It feels nice, having someone else wash his hair. He always gets soap in his eyes when he does it himself, and it stings.

Afterwards, she wraps his damp head in a towel and gives him a nice friendly smile, but another tear leaks down his pale cheek anyways. He doesn’t like feeling dirty. He doesn’t like being made fun of by the other kids at school.

He’s surprised and maybe a little shocked even when Monica immediately kneels in front of him and pulls him into a tight hug, but after a moment, he hugs her back just as hard, jamming his face against her shoulder and sniffling.

Her pink sweater is soft. He closes his eyes. It smells like laundry detergent.

When Ian comes home after school, he doesn’t say anything about the lice check at all, just says hi to him happily and then hums while Monica washes his hair too, and then Lip’s, both of them acting like it’s perfectly normal for this to happen before they ask him to play cars.

Mickey doesn’t understand why, cause they don’t have lice, but now he doesn’t feel weird or embarrassed anymore because they have towels on their head too.

The next day at school, when some of the girls start to call him dirty Mickey, and he gets ready to start yelling and throwing kicks in his defense, Ian stands in front of him instead, catching him off guard.

 “Shut up” Ian says defiantly, his red hair blazing as his sticks out his chin at them, “Lice like clean heads actually, so you’re the dirty ones I bet”.

The girls don’t make fun of Mickey for having lice after that.

**October 2002**

“I _can_ juggle” Mr. Gallagher insists, but he keeps dropping every single ball he tries to toss upwards and catch in front of his dubious audience of six and seven-year olds at Ian’s seventh birthday party, Mrs. Gallagher clapping her hands together the whole time anyways like he’s doing it perfectly.

Lip leans over and mutters, “He can’t” and a few of the kids snigger. They are all south side kids, they know a drunk when they see one, even at this age.

“Oh shut up” Frank growls, shaking his head in annoyance before he tosses the balls to the ground in defeat, “Wouldn’t know talent if your unformed brains saw it”.

“That was so good baby” Monic coos while she follows him into the kitchen as he grabs another beer, rubbing his shoulder the whole way.

Mickey notices how much Mr. and Mrs. Gallagher touch each other, and it seems like they actually love, if not at least like each other. He wonders why his parents never act that way. All their touch is hard, usually angry.

He used to think that was normal…but now he’s not so sure.

“Mickey!” Ian calls out, and Mickey turns to smile at his best friend, punching the pale blue balloon Ian tosses back in his direction for a game of back and forth that most of the other kids are playing now too.

After a while Monica calls out that its time for cake and then presents, and Ian looks very excited. He wants Mickey to sit beside him at the table, so he does, looking at how Ian’s face glows from the birthday candles. Ian’s face…makes him feel happy inside.

His best friend’s green eyes look so bright like that, but he scrunches them shut as he pauses to make his birthday wish before blowing out the candles. Mickey wonders what his best friend wished for.

He thinks about if it was his birthday. He would wish for…he would wish that he was here, at the Gallagher house, with Ian, all the time.

“Mickey, go stand beside Ian for a picture!” Monica says, singling him out after a few group shots. He’s proud, because he’s Ian’s best friend, and he gets a picture just with him. He puts his arm around his best friend as he stands beside him, Ian doing the same as they squeeze each other and laugh.

“Alright, who wants cake?” Frank asks after the shots, putting down his beer as he holds up the cake slicer. A chorus of seven and eight-year olds call out their me’s! Lip making sure he is the loudest as he drums on the table like an animal.

Mickey digs into his cake eagerly when he gets a slice, and after a few mouthfuls he looks over to see Ian smiling at him, his cheeks flushed with happiness. “Happy birthday Ian” he says again through his mouthful of cake, the frosting sweet and spread across his teeth. He never went to birthday parties before he met Ian, and he loves them.

Through all the chatter of the kids at the party, Ian doesn’t need to, but he leans in to whisper in Mickey’s ear anyways, his breath hot and sweet smelling as he asks, “Do you want to know what I wished for Mickey?”

Mickey nods his head yes, eyes turning to Ian in surprise. Ian trusts him with the secret. He decides whatever it is, he’ll try and make Ian’s wish come true.

Ian pauses, and then whispers again, his sticky hand stick still cupped against Mickey’s cheek, “I wished you could be here all the time”.

Mickey swallows his mouthful of cake. He doesn’t know what to say.

So while Ian smiles at him, he just reaches over and hugs his best friend tight, Ian’s party hat getting nudged off his head from the impact of it. But Ian doesn’t care about his stupid hat, he just hugs him back.

“How about presents now?” Monica asks, a flurry of kids rushing past her to grab their presents for Ian. Mickey gets to his little awkwardly wrapped present last, and Ian is already opening his first present by the time he gets back. The more presents he opens though, the more Mickey’s cheeks start to burn.

All these kid’s parents this year took them out to buy cool new toys for Ian. Mickey didn’t have any money to do that, and his parents wouldn’t let him have any of theirs, so he wrapped his favorite hot wheels for Ian and made him a birthday card.

That was it. A stupid car and a stupid card.

He decides to hide his present, but stupid Melissa from their class says loudly when Ian is done unwrapping presents, “Mickey has one too!”

Ian looks towards him all excited, and Mickey almost looks for some place to hide. But that would make Ian sad, and he doesn’t want that either. Keeping his eyes low in embarrassment, he slowly walks toward his best friend, shoving the package out towards him with the card taped to it.

He’s relieved when Ian doesn’t read the card aloud, just reads it himself privately and smiles up at him before he puts it carefully down beside himself and opens up the present.

He doesn’t say anything at first, and Mickey is terrified he’s mad, or worse upset. He’s supposed to be his best friend, and he didn’t even get him a good present.

“Mickey…this is your favorite” Ian says slowly, and when Mickey finally makes himself look at him, he realizes Ian is shocked. “I can’t keep your favorite” Ian insists, trying to hand it back to him. He knows how special it is. But that’s exactly why Mickey wants him to have it.

“It’s yours now” he smiles, sitting down again and pushing it back into Ian’s hands, his best friend carefully holding it.

It might not be brand new. It might not be expensive. But it’s clear that Mickey’s present means more to Ian than any of the others, and that makes him happy.

**February 2003**

February is a special month at Oak Elementary school for all the second graders. They have a Valentine’s Day party, and put on a school play at the end of the month for all their parents to come see too.

Mickey like this school a lot better than his old one, mostly because he has a best friend now, but also because they have nicer stuff to use than he did at Harvey Public School. On Valentine’s Day they all get paper cards to draw on for all the other kids in the class, but Mickey gets bored after making only three.

He only wants to make one for Ian, and one for his Mama, because everyone else is doing that too. So, he spends extra time drawing Ian’s valentine with silly faces on it, and then after a moment of thought, a green heart too. Like Ian’s eyes, he thinks.

He gets valentines from some of the other kids in his class but he only really smiles at Ian’s, who tried to draw them as cowboys on it.

“See? That’s your hat, and that’s a gun. I don’t know how to draw horses though” Ian tells him, smiling as he points out the details on the card while they sift through their little piles of mostly heart shaped candies.

Mickey grins around the red lollipop jammed in his mouth, “I love it”.

“Your tongues red” Ian tells him.

“Is it?” Mickey asks, sticking it out at him while his best friend starts to giggle.

The play they put on after school for all the parents is kind of funny, one kid is dressed up as cupid, and most of the other kids are running away from him, or asking him for favors. Ian asks cupid to help make Sarah in their class fall in love with him, and cupid throws a foam arrow at her. Then Sarah pretends like she loves Ian too. Mickey is supposed to run away from cupid when its his turn, because he doesn’t want an arrow, but at the last minute he pauses on accident and it hits him anyways.

“That wasn’t supposed to hit you!” Josh yells out, who’s playing cupid, “You don’t love anyone!” Mickey doesn’t actually remember what he’s supposed to be doing anymore though, and he looks over towards Ian for help, who just give him a thumbs up and a grin.

In the end, he ends up just going off stage, but other kids mess up too, so it doesn’t really matter.  

After the play is done, Mickey stands beside the plastic tray for wet boots outside of the school auditorium, his own pair feeling damp around his little feet. He wriggles his toes inside of them. Feels like there’s a hole in the left one.

He scratches his back while he watches more kids from his class walk past with their parents and families, heading out into the snowy night all happy and laughing, holding gloved hands. A lot of the kids have given their parents their valentines that they made today in class, Mickey’s is still folded in his pocket.

He didn’t see where his Mama and Dad sat in the gym during the play, but he figured they would walk out here after and he could find them that way, and give his Mama her valentine then.

There’s almost no one left by the time Ian and his big loud family come out, because they had stayed behind to change both Carl’s and Debbie’s dirty diapers, and they smile at him when they see him waiting there, enveloping him into their warm conversation while Ian pulls on his boots beside him.

There’s a pause when he’s done, and then Ian looks around, his voice standing out among the others. “Where’s your Mama?”

Mickey shakes his head, “I don’t know”.

“Oh…” Mrs. Gallagher looks behind herself at the gym, her normally happy face sinking a little as she looks down at Mickey, and he doesn’t understand at first. But then she says, “Why don’t you come with us Mickey? We’re going to McDonald’s for some hot fudge sundaes! We can bring you home after too”.

Mickey looks behind her too, and sees the empty seats where all the parents sat. And then he realizes his didn’t come. He looks down at his old boots, embarrassed for waiting. He should have just walked home by himself. Suddenly he hates the stupid valentine in his pocket.

But then he feels Ian’s glove touching his bare hand, and he looks up to see his best friend’s freckly face smiling at him, “C’mon Mickey. They have chocolate, and caramel, and even strawberry you can pick from”.

Mickey nods, and then smiles, following the big family outside into the snow. He doesn’t have his gloves today, so Ian gives him one of his own to wear.

At McDonald’s, he gets a chocolate fudge sundae, Ian gets caramel, and Lip gets strawberry so they can all try each other’s. Monica and Frank say they can all play in the Playplace for a half an hour after they are done eating their ice cream, but no more before they have to go home. Fiona doesn’t want to play in there, she’s too big now, but the three boys chase each other around inside the Playplace and throw themselves down the slides until Frank comes inside the small room and laughs, telling them they are a “bunch of hooligans” and it’s time to go.

Lip and Ian think that’s hilarious, and keep shoving each other around in the piles of snow outside the McDonald’s when they leave and calling each other hooligans, but Mickey pauses behind the rest of them walking in all in a group together, and looks straight up at the sky.

The snow is falling so slow tonight. It's swirling lazily in all directions, like it doesn’t care where it will end up, because it knows it will get there eventually.

He feels small flakes hitting his warm face and melting, but he keeps looking up until he hears Ian’s voice calling out shrilly for him to come on!

Running to catch up to the family, Mickey really wishes that he was a Gallagher too tonight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There will be more added to this fic but I won't be posting very much over the holidays. If you want to stay updated please sub for the next time I post :)


	4. Part 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A couple years after part 3 :)

**Part 4 (Roughly Ages 8 & 9)**

**July 2004**

“Here ya go kid”.

Mickey reaches out to take the black plastic tray Terry offers towards him, breathing in the smell of previously frozen Salisbury steak and gravy deeply as he places it on his lap.

“Thanks Dad”.

Terry nods his acknowledgement towards his youngest son as the two of them sit on the worn out old couch together in middle of their living room, the creaky side-of-the-road fan doing its very best to rotate and cool them with unsteady blasts of air in the sweltering summer heat, grinding over the sounds of tonight’s football game.

Mickey stirs the food around on his dinner tray with a white plastic fork, knowing by experience that his Dad never heats their frozen dinners properly. They are always burning hot around the edges and still frozen in the inside, but if you stir them enough they are edible.

His Dad also won’t do dishes, so they only ever use cups or trays or utensils you can just throw out after. That being said, it’s Mickey’s job to take out all the garbage.

Whenever Terry makes a comment about the football game, either a pleased grunt or a pissed off toss of his hand towards the screen as if the players _can_ and _should_ see his disgust, Mickey quickly swallows his food, and copies his dad’s overt annoyance at the players.

It’s better to be on the same page as Dad, because every once a while he’ll look over, and nod his approval at Mickey’s similar actions.

Mama left the house last month, and she took Mandy with her. She said that her sister was sick, and she needed to stay with her for a while on the other side of Chicago to take care of her. After a few fights in which Mickey realized how much his Dad didn’t like that plan, she left anyways.

That left just Mickey and Terry in the Milkovich house other than Iggy’s occasional visit, and neither of them was quite sure how they felt about that at first. There were good things and bad things about Mama being gone, Mickey had eventually decided, though he never did know exactly how his Dad felt about being stuck with him.  

Things were good because Dad let him swear now, whenever and about whatever he wanted, and Dad always got them takeout or frozen dinners too, which were in his opinion better than Mama’s pretty limited cooking. Spaghetti, Mac and Cheese, Frozen Pierogies... over and over again.

There were also two less people in the house to make Dad angry, so it was a little quieter... maybe a little less on edge too.

The bad part was that when Terry _did_ get angry, or drunk, there was no one else to take it out on anymore, so Mickey had to get a little better at hiding in the house, squeezing himself into closets past draping coats, or dragging himself underneath his low bed until Terry eventually settled down and got quiet, meaning he had passed out somewhere.

Dad said they were spending “father and son time” when they watched their football games and ate dinner together on nights like this, and that made Mickey feel sort of special. They never really spent time together before his Mama had gone away.

When the game is over though, just like he always does, Terry sniffs and lights a pungent cigarette, and says boredly without looking over at him, “Beat it”.

So off Mickey goes, to his favorite place in the world.

Just down the road.

He knocks on the Gallagher’s front door lazily until Frank finally answers, belching as he looks down at him like he has a right to judge him.

“There gonna be one night this summer you don’t show up?” Frank asks, peering over his beer. Probably not his first, or second, knowing Ian’s Dad.

Mickey shrugs. Probably not.

Frank moves aside to let him in the house with a sarcastic wave of his hand, but Mickey pauses reluctantly when Monica reaches out towards him as he passes by. She’s sitting in the living room with both of the babies, and she smells a little bit like baby puke.

Sour.

He does his best not to wrinkle his nose as she asks kindly, baby Carl trying to grab at her breast the entire time, “Did you eat dinner Mickey?”

She asks him that all the time. Or if he’s had lunch. Or sometimes even breakfast, depending on when he shows up. But Dad remembers to feed him most of the time, and if he doesn’t, Mickey is big enough to make his own food now.

“Yes”.

“Okay. Ian’s in the backyard hon”.

Mickey nods, eagerly ditching his shoes at the overflowing plastic shoe tray by the front door of the Gallagher’s house.

He likes going absolutely barefoot in the summer, and he would everywhere and all the time if he didn’t end up cutting his foot so badly last summer on broken sidewalk glass that he had to get emergency stitches, a cost his Dad was not happy to pay for.

Mickey lets the screen door bang behind himself carelessly as he hikes down the steps towards the cool and grassy lawn, squinting in the dark towards the little boy sitting in the middle of it, looking straight up at the sky.

Without a word, Mickey plops down beside him, noticing that Ian is barefoot just like him, and similarly smudged with dirt and grass stains.

“What are you doing?” he finally asks.

“Looking for aliens” Ian answers as drily as he can, but despite his best efforts, his serious voice breaks into a laugh that only gets louder as Mickey reaches over to wrestle him against the grass.

Ian grabs a big handful of the unmowed lawn and tries to jam it in Mickey’s mouth, who stubbornly shuts his mouth and grabs Ian’s wrist to make him drop it. “C’mon Mick you might like it!” Ian laughs wildly, trying to grab for the grass again.

“I’m not a fucking cow!” Mickey yells back, tossing some of it at his best friend. “Moooo” Ian answers as they mutually break apart from their scuffle, grinning at each other and shaking their hair to get the grass out. It’s too hot to play fight.

For a moment, they both look up in unison together at the dark night sky again like there was something else to be seen up there, and then Ian turns to him, “Let’s go see what Lip’s doing”.

Mickey nods his head in agreement. Ever since Lip turned 10, he thought he was better than the two of them. He was always calling them “little kids”, even though he was only a year or so older than them. So they made it their mission to bug him whenever possible in response. He wasn’t _always_ a jerk, but it was fun to do anyways.

As soon as they open the screen door and step inside the Gallagher house, Ian pauses to turn towards Monica, who’s now heating a bottle of milk at the kitchen sink. “Can Mickey stay over tonight?” he asks.

They both wait for an answer.

Mickey actually never had to be asked if he _wanted_ to stay over, that was a given, he _always_ wanted to stay over. Luckily, like most nights, Monica smiles and nods happily, “Of course. But go wash your feet in the tub at least, you’re both filthy”.

Ian rolls his green eyes and sighs dramatically at his mother’s request, but darts up the stairs anyways, Mickey closely following him into the Gallagher’s upstairs bathroom.

There’s plastic baby toys everywhere, an old potty training seat, and dozens of other things that don’t really belong in the bathroom. But its familiar to Mickey, just like home, and when Ian waves him over to the tub he’s filling with warm water and overgenerous squirts of soap, he doesn’t argue.

Splashing their feet at each other while they sit on the edge of the porcelain tub and kick off the dirt, Mickey hums to himself happily. Even after four years he still loved sleepovers. Him and Ian were getting older, sure, and they didn’t hold hands or anything babyish like that anymore, but they still were best friends.

He was pretty sure that would never change.

Fiona comes into the bathroom about ten minutes later and glances over at them impatiently, “You guys almost done? I have to pee”.

“Give me a towel” Ian answers, sticking his hand behind himself to reach for it. They both get out of the tub and stomp their feet on the towel Fiona selects for them before they abandon the bathroom and head to the boy’s room.

Lip is sitting on his own bed, his brow furrowed as he stares intently at the pages of the book in front of him. It’s a big one, looks like it has a lot of chapters, and Mickey frowns at it, “Why are you reading? It’s summer” he says in disbelief.

Long gone are the days of storybooks before bedtime in the Gallagher house, and Mickey’s only interest in books right now are comic books. Sometimes he likes to imagine he’s a superhero, that everyone needs and loves, but he would never admit to that of course.

“You can read whenever dumbass, it doesn’t just have to be for school” Lip answers, flipping the unillustrated page to the next. Ian sticks out his tongue at his older brother but Mickey just laughs, “Nerd”. They end up distracting Lip from his book anyways until Fiona finally pokes her head in the room with her routine comment, “It’s bedtime now guys, love you”.

Obediently, they all get up and start to change into their pajama bottoms, but the bedroom is ridiculously hot to try and sleep in, and they don’t even have a fan in it to move the air around.

Lip eventually tries to force the window open more, but the air outside is still and muggy, and it doesn’t help much. “Fiona, it’s too hot in here” Ian complains, going to get his sister, but her light is already out and she doesn’t answer.

Ian and Mickey try not to touch as they get into the small bed together to avoid sharing body heat, but it’s still too hot to sleep, and after a half hour of tossing and turning restlessly Ian’s had enough.  
“Let’s sleep outside” he whispers, his freckled face hovering near Mickey’s in the dark.

“Okay” Mickey whispers back. Quietly, they both get out of the bed, and since Lip doesn’t say anything, they both assume he’s finally fallen asleep. Yanking the top blanket from his bed, Ian waves for Mickey to follow him, the both of them trying not to childishly laugh as they tiptoe down the stairs quietly and out into the backyard.

“Phew” Ian says, taking a deep breath as he spreads out the blanket on the grass, “It’s better outside”.

“Yeah” Mickey agrees, walking a few feet away to choose a bush to pee in so he doesn’t have to sneak back inside. When he’s done peeing he joins his best friend on the old blanket, the two of them breathing more comfortably in the fresh air.

They look up for a while and then Ian laughs softly, “Did I tell you Lip says he has a girlfriend?”

Mickey shakes his head in disbelief, “No. Why would he even want one?” All the girls at their school were annoying, always flipping their hair and whispering to each other and putting on sparkly lip gloss. Who needs that crap?

“That’s what I said!” Ian answers, “But he’s probably lying anyways. I bet he’s never even kissed a girl”.

Suddenly Mickey’s stomach feels a little weird. Like worried maybe, he’s not sure. He clears his throat before he carefully asks, “Have you?”

Why he did never think of that before? Of each of them…kissing girls? Iggy talked about it before, but Mickey just never cared to listen. It wasn’t a topic of interest to him at all. But maybe they were supposed to have by now? He really doesn’t like the thought of that.

“No” Ian answers, turning to look at him slowly, “Have you?”

Curiosity for each of their answers settles as Mickey shakes his head emphatically, “No. And I don’t want to”.

“Yeah. Me neither” Ian agrees. On that reassuring note, they each take a deep and relaxing breath before they start to drift off to sleep underneath Chicago's dark sky. 

**September 2004**

“Alright Tigers, let’s go! Michael, you’re up! Milkovich, move forward, you’re too far outfield”.

Mickey nods his head to his overbearing coach and advances on the small baseball diamond’s field that his and Ian’s team practices on every Friday after school.

Mickey himself didn’t actually love baseball, or team sports in general, but Ian had gotten interested in the sport a few months ago and as soon as his best friend signed up to play for the school’s junior team, it was a given that Mickey would too.

Generally speaking, anywhere one of them went, the other did too.

He had practically begged his dad for the $20 registration fee for days, and Terry Milkovich finally reluctantly gave in, muttering that it might be good for the boy to play some sports after all. He had started lately to compare Mickey to his half-brother Iggy during his visits, and it was getting annoying.

“I’m not Iggy” he finally said one day, frustrated, “I’m me”. But “ _me_ ” wasn’t good enough for Terry Milkovich, and although he gave Mickey the money to sign up with, he wouldn’t let him see Ian after school for two days, not to mention the angry shove he received, bruising his spine painfully on the cabinet handle he fell against.

Michael hits the ball on his second unenergetic try but it doesn’t go far enough for any of the outfielders to make a run for it so Mickey simply watches passively as Michael runs slowly to first base, reaching down to yank up some grass absentmindedly while he does. Honestly, he finds the whole thing a little boring. At least in soccer you can fight someone for the ball.

His interest is finally caught again when it’s Ian’s turn to step up to the plate, his best friend’s face absolutely serious as he leans and does a little wiggle to get into position, just like the real players do.

Mickey straightens up a bit, frowning towards his best friend as he studies his face. When did Ian’s bright red freckles start to fade a bit? His face used to be covered…now it seems like there’s less.

Ian hits the baseball on his first swing with a loud and satisfying crack, a proud smile stretching across his beaming face as he agilely starts to round the bases, Mickey running for the ball alongside his teammate Shawn as it hits the ground and bounces along the grass. Shawn reaches it first and throws it hard, so Mickey immediately goes back to watching Ian as his best friend attempts to slide into third.

Devon is the third baseman today, and he looks pissed off right now. Ian is one of the Tiger’s best players, and sometimes the other guys on the team get jealous during practice when they end up against him. Not Mickey though. He’s only ever been proud.

Right as Ian starts his slide Devon jerks forward and puts his forearm out, slamming it against Ian’s throat. Caught off guard, Ian falls backwards and hits his head hard against the gravel, grunting in pain as it bounces from the impact. The coach instantly starts to scream at Devon while the rest of the team looks on anxiously, but Mickey just runs, throwing his mitt away and quickly sliding onto the ground beside Ian, not even noticing the way the gravel tears at his own knees.

“Ian?” he murmurs quietly, concerned.

Ian’s face is very red, and it looks like he’s probably trying very hard not to cry as he reaches out for the hand Mickey offers him to pull him up, stiff as he gets to his feet. “Are you okay?” Mickey continues as Ian brushes his uniform off, but his best friend doesn’t answer, instead jogging towards the school like he’s just going to use the bathroom without a word to any of them.

Mickey automatically wants to follow him, his whole being is filled with concern, but first he turns to shove Devon down onto the diamond, who was still getting shit from the coach and didn’t see it coming. “Leave it Milkovich!” Coach Green yells, but Mickey is too angry, and he grabs his teammate by the shirt to shake him, “You fuck with Ian you fuck with me” he growls, blue eyes burning.

“Piss off!” Devon yells back, trying to swing upwards. Mickey takes one good punch to the jaw that he figures will bruise before the coach hauls his ass off of Devon to separate them, but Mickey’s already done with punishing his teammate and jogging towards the school to find Ian, and make sure he’s okay.  

The boy’s bathroom closest to the door Ian ran for appears empty when he first steps inside it. Its after school so the junior boy’s baseball team is the only one using the field or the school otherwise.

Pausing though, Mickey hears a morose sniff, so he bends downwards to peek beneath the bathroom doors. He sees a familiar pair of red and white running shoes standing in one of the stalls and he walks over to lean against the door gently.

“Mickey?” he hears, Ian’s voice low and careful in an attempt to disguise its tremble.

“Yeah it’s me” he answers, trying to hide his own worry.

“I bit my lip when I fell, it’s bleeding a lot” Ian tells him.

Mickey immediately straightens up and turns around, “Open the door Ian”. He might be used to taking care of himself, but Ian wasn’t.

After a moment Ian reluctantly does open the door, his face still very red from the tears he couldn’t keep from falling, but it’s not until he opens his mouth to show Mickey the cut inside that he sees the bright red blood staining his friend’s teeth.  

Mickey immediately feels angry again, so as he gently inspects Ian’s face in his hands through his friend’s shuddering breaths, he mutters, “I kicked Devon’s ass”.

“Yeah?” Ian tries to say with his mouth open, and Mickey can see the smile forming on his friend’s face at the thought of it. “Yeah” he answers happily, “You’ll be okay by the way, it’s slowing down. Just spit in the sink til it stops”.

“Okay” Ian garbles, closing his mouth and walking over to the sink. While he stands there spitting and then rubbing his nose every so often, Mickey stands beside him, tentatively reaching over to rub Ian’s back. It just felt like it was what he was supposed to do.

Ian looks over at him, his face seeming tired but happy again. “Mickey, you’re my best friend. Don’t know what I’d do without you”. Mickey smiles down towards his feet but doesn’t say anything. Because what would he do without Ian?

Then Ian adds something they had started to say something a lot less often once they started to get older, “I love you”.

Mickey’s blue eyes quickly flash towards Ian, but his friend is now looking at his mouth in the mirror, checking the cut.

He’d heard those words from Ian lots of times before, but this time…it just felt different. Mickey takes his hand away from Ian’s back, nodding before he answers, “I love you too”.

**December 2004**

Mickey is huffing and puffing by the time he finally makes it through the snow and up to his sheltering house, eager to start the winter break.

The snow has been falling relentlessly in Chicago for the past week or so, making each day an absolute pain in the ass to get to school, mostly because the people who live in his neighborhood are too damn lazy to shovel their sidewalks.

That’s what his Dad says anyways. But he doesn’t shovel theirs either, so Mickey’s not sure whether he’s supposed to agree that they’re lazy or just… usually he just says nothing. It’s safer that way. Dad’s been getting angrier lately and he’s not sure why.

Not until he steps into his house and stomps the snow off his winter boots before starting to slowly peel off his jacket with frozen and unhelpful fingers.

“Hi Mickey…”

Mickey’s head immediately snaps up towards the familiar voice, and then even though he sees his mother and Mandy standing _right_ there in the kitchen, he looks back at the boots by the front door that he somehow hadn’t noticed a moment ago like they could confirm what he was seeing. 

She had been gone for months, never even making a phone call even to see how he was doing… And now she was just…here?

Mickey’s confused, because he’s wanted her home for a while, but now that she’s actually here he feels angry. And almost like he’s seeing a ghost.

“I made hot chocolate, come sit down” Anastasiya Milkovich says, gesturing plainly towards the steaming mugs on the table. Mickey suspiciously passes by them to make it to the table, gruffly responding to Mandy’s “hi” with one of his own. His sister looks happy, chubbier in the cheeks. 

“Where’s Dad?” he asks as soon as she hands him a mug.

 “Out with his friends” his mother answers, her face revealing nothing. Or maybe it does. She looks…younger than she did the last time he saw her, and he’s not sure how that’s possible. Her hair is cut differently now too, with styled bangs framing her pale and pretty face.

“I want to apologize to you Mickey” she says a while later, still watching him sip at the hot chocolate that is much too hot when Mandy goes off to play in her room, “I wasn’t planning on being gone for that long”.

Mickey’s throat suddenly feels tight, and he bites his lip to keep himself from tearing up like a big baby as soon as he notices his eyes are starting to sting. He didn’t realize how much he had missed her.

Maybe because he spent so much of his time at the Gallagher’s, maybe because sometimes he pretended Monica was his mother.

But _she_ was his mother, and she had just disappeared.

“How’s school going?” she asks quietly after a few moments of silence, playing with the old wedding ring on her finger.

“Good” he answers lowly, “I’m on the baseball team. We play again in April”.

“I heard. Your dad was happy about that”.

He doesn’t answer, so she tries again to make conversation, “How’s Ian?”

“Still my best friend” he answers, prickling slightly. She never seemed to notice Ian while she was here before.

“I know you’re mad. I guess I would be too. I just needed to get away for a while” she sighs.

 _Yeah. And you took Mandy, and not me,_ he thinks. _You didn’t even say goodbye. You never say goodbye._

“But I’m back now, and so is your sister” she says firmly, as if that’s that. As if that solves everything.

Mickey pushes his chair back and gets up from the table with a casual sniff, as if he couldn’t care less. He still feels like he’s stinging inside though, and he wants to call Ian. He’ll ask if he can come over, if he can talk to him. He just wants to be with Ian.

“Whatever mum, just don’t disappear again” he mutters before he leaves.


	5. Part 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To the people who follow my writing: Not dead, just having creativity issues. But here I am with another update finally! 
> 
> PLEASE NOTE: Again, they are growing older in this one and beginning to hit puberty so I would like to say the rating changes to TEEN from here on. As they are still young however, I'm not going into graphic descriptions at this point. Basically it's just Mickey starting to suspect something is a little different about him compared to most boys he knows.

**PART 5 _Roughly Ages 10 and 11_**

**June 2006**

None of the young boys are exactly surprised when the theatre attendant comes stomping down the aisle with a flashlight to escort their giggling asses out of The Dukes of Hazzard showing, they had been goofing off and chucking popcorn at both each other and the other PO’ed movie goers almost since the movie began, but they _are_ surprised to see who the theatre attendant is once they exit the theatre’s darkness.

Mickey and Ian, along with three of their other male classmates from school, look at each other hesitantly as Fiona Gallagher raises her eyebrows sharply at them, clutching her theatre flashlight firmly in one hand and waving her other one around for emphasis, a beaded bracelet bouncing on her thin wrist.

“Why am I not surprised to see that it’s _you_?” she demands, looking from her brother and then to Mickey, like ‘you’ automatically means them together and causing trouble.

To be fair, maybe it does. They do seem to be starting shit more often than not, but that’s not exactly different from any of the other boys their age. Mickey had come a long way from being the lonely four-year-old spying on neighborhood kids and wishing for a friend of his own.

He didn’t even know Fiona worked at the mall’s movie theatre, but he now vaguely recalls seeing the red vest the unimpressed seventeen-year-old in front of them is wearing strewn over a chair in the Gallagher’s house once or twice before. Ian on the other hand, did know she worked here.

“You weren’t supposed to be in today, I checked the fridge calendar!” he argues back.

She grabs his wrist firmly to get his attention, the other ten and eleven-year-old boys shrinking away from her a little bit. She could be fucking intimidating, when she wanted to be. “Ian Gallagher if you come back to this theatre, _dammit,_ if any of you come back and cause trouble for me again, I’ll make sure you’re all banned. Permanently” she growls.

“Aw, Fiona…” Mickey starts to mumble, but she shoots him a warning look and she shuts up. He doesn’t believe she can actually even ban them all permanently, but its probably not worth chancing it either. Movies are one of the few good escapes in this shitty part of town.  

“Go” she finally says, pointing the five of them towards the exit. They all follow her direction, serious at first but then they break back into their usual goofing off and shoving each other around as they pile into the mall’s mostly empty hallway that the theatre is connected to.

“Your sister’s so hot man” Jake drawls after a while, grinning towards Ian.

Ryan and Diego nod their enthusiastic agreement, and while Ian frowns, Jake turns to elbow Mickey for his input.

“Isn’t she, Milkovich?”

Mickey hesitates. He’s not as close to these guys as he is to Ian, they just all hang out in a group sometimes to chuck stones at the trains racing across the El, or to crash a movie like this. So he’s careful about how he answers.

“Dude, she’s like a sister to me. Shut up”.

That part was true, anyways. Fiona was like a sister to him. Was she pretty? Yes. But he didn’t feel anything when he looked at her. Not like other guys his age apparently did.

Jake shrugs his shoulders at his disappointing answer, but Ian glances over at him gratefully as the five of them cruise the mall in boredom, looking for something else to do, Fiona thankfully no longer the topic of conversation.

Something to do shows up in the form of Iggy Milkovich, Mickey’s half-brother, who is walking around the mall with his hands in his pockets, his denim jeans baggy and low, his Avenged Sevenfold hat on backwards. He looks older than he is, and he looks _cool._

“Yo Ig!” Mickey calls out, waving him over and doing a quick introduction, “These are my boys Diego, Ryan and Jake. You already know Ian”.

“Yeah, sup guys” Iggy answers, nodding his head casually, “What are you up to?”

“Nothing, we’re bored” Diego answers, gesturing back to the theatre, “We got kicked out”.

Iggy laughs, “Yeah for some pussy shit I bet”. He joins the loud and boisterous group, all of them heading outside of the mall and past the parking lot to a row of poorly tended hedges. And then he pulls out a pack of smokes. At first Mickey frowns, because he didn’t know his brother smoked. But then he can tell some of his other friends are interested.

“You gonna share?” Ryan jokes.

Iggy scrunches his face at them, “You guys ever smoked before?”

Ian, Mickey and Diego shake their heads no, Jake and Ryan say yes but they are probably lying, stupid turds, Mickey thinks. Still, Iggy taps on his pack of Marlboro’s until he has one for each of them and he passes them around.

Nothing about smokes is unfamiliar to Mickey. Not the smell or the feel of them. His parents go through a pack a day each, he breathes it in second hand as often as he breathes in fresh air. But he’s never actually smoked a cigarette himself.

He glances over at Ian and they put their cigarettes in their mouths at the same time, waiting for Iggy to light them. After he does, going around the circle, he steps back and laughs, “Well duh, breath in”.

Diego and Ian both start to choke when they first breathe in, but maybe the other two boys weren’t lying because they take it pretty smoothly, like Mickey does. At first. Then he starts to cough, the dry raspy feeling in his throat unfamiliar and choking.

Still, he’s not a fucking pussy as Iggy likes to call him when he comes over, so he steels his lungs and finishes the smoke, stomping it under his foot when he’s done. Ian does the same, eventually getting over his coughing fit and getting into the feel of it more easily. They both wave away the offer of a second one though, annoyed at how amused Iggy is over the whole thing.

“I gotta get going guys” Mickey eventually says, sensing Ian wants to leave, “You coming man?”

Ian nods eagerly and they wave goodbye to the disintegrating group after exchanging a few more jokes and shoulder pushes, heading out around the mall and back towards home on their own.

“That was kinda gross” Ian admits after a while, spitting onto the sidewalk. Mickey nods, but actually, he didn’t feel so different than before.

**February 2006**

Lip laughs when he hears about what happened to Mickey at school today, but Ian doesn’t seem to find it funny at all. He’s been in a weird mood all day though, something that was making an already confused and miserable Mickey feel even worse.

“So what happened, she just kissed you?” Lip guffaws, tossing his binder from his lap to the bed as he tries to get his friend to spill about what he had already heard rumors about.

Unfortunately, that’s exactly what happened. Gianna Rodríguez, a loud girl from his and Ian’s class at school today, had informed Mickey he was going to be her valentine next week, and then just grabbed his face, slamming her lips against his.

It actually kind of hurt.

Mickey’s head was fucking spinning after. Not because he just had his first kiss…but because he had his first kiss and he didn’t feel anything. Gianna wasn’t too pleased with his reaction, or lack thereof. His unsettled worry only deepens when Lip’s teasing continues, “Bet you popped a boner right on the spot”.

Ian grunts uncomfortably but Mickey adamantly denies it even though he’s not 100% sure what they are talking about now, “No!”

But he assumes something was supposed to happen, downstairs or whatever, and nothing did. This puberty thing his brother talked about, and sometimes the other kids at school, didn’t make any sense to him. Girls were as uninteresting to him now as they were back when he was just a little kid.

“Well you’re both eleven now, it’s about damn time” Lip finally says approvingly, regardless of his denial, “And Ian, you’re next. Gotta find a girl willing to kiss your ginger ass though”.

Ian just frowns again, before quickly saying, “Let’s go play PlayStation Mickey, I fixed the second remote”.

Mickey eagerly nods his head, grateful for the change of subject. Part of him is worried that Ian’s mad at him for having a first kiss before he did, so after a slightly awkward half hour or so of multiplayer Takedown he admits, “It wasn’t that great. Actually, it was terrible”.

Ian looks over at him immediately, his expression unreadable. But maybe…maybe its relieved?

“You didn’t like it?” he asks, before more carefully adding, “You don’t like her?”

“Fuck no” he promises, relieved to see Ian’s stony expression finally dissolve. He adds too, still worried Ian might be feeling self-conscious, “I’m sure some girl will kiss you soon too. And a lot of people like gingers, Lip’s full of shit”.

_Dammit. Did he say the wrong thing again?_

Ian barely shrugs, his eyes glued on the screen again.

_Maybe he should just say what he’s thinking? It’s not that weird is it, admitting he likes his best friend’s hair?_

“I like-“

Fiona comes bursting into the room, her tone filled with annoyance, and there go his plans of trying to explain anything to Ian. “Jesus Christ Ian! If I have to tell you one more time not to leave your bike blocking the walkway I swear to God…”

**May, 2006**

Mickey sneaks up from his place on Ian’s bedroom floor towards the bathroom, glad everyone else in the Gallagher house is still sleeping. He needs to splash cold water on his face a few times to get his dick to go down.

He finally understood what Lip was talking about when he said “popping a boner”, although it has nothing to do with girls apparently.

It seems to just happen whenever, and it was happening more and more lately, but at least he didn’t wake up with a wet spot in his boxers this morning. Sometimes that happens at home, and he had no fucking idea what was happening until Iggy came over one day, showing him the porn he was now obsessed with watching on the VHS player while his Dad was out, and the messy endings. 

Apparently it was normal for guys to do that, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t embarrassing. When it happens at home, Mickey balls up his laundry tightly before he throws into the piles his mother washes, determined to never say a word about it to her.

Although she had stayed in the home since her disappearance to her sister’s house a couple years ago, Mickey and her still never grew close. Of course, they never really had been. He just got over his childish dependence on her.

He glances over towards Ian’s bed as he quietly returns to the boy’s bedroom. He wonders if it ever happens to Ian, this messy thing, but he doesn’t really want to ask that. Something tells him that’s not okay.

He knows that Ian’s dick gets hard too, back when he was still sleeping in his bed, there was one night he woke up with Ian’s touching his lower back, poking against it. Ian was completely passed out on his side beside him though, so he had no idea he was doing it. Mickey never said anything. Fiona commented they were getting too big to both fit in Ian’s small bed a couple weeks later anyways, so now he always slept in a sleeping bag on the floor.

The only thing is, sometime he kinda misses sharing a bed with Ian. It was always warmer, and he felt safer there, even though Ian would grab at him sometimes when he had nightmares. Even though he always had cold feet that he’d press against Mickey to keep warm. Even though he snored sometimes.

Maybe those things weren’t so bad after all.

When Ian finally gets up about an hour later, he doesn’t bother combing down his messy red hair, just smiles lazily at Mickey and says a mumbled good morning before they both go downstairs together to grab some cereal for breakfast.

Mickey grabs the milk and pours while Ian shuffles the box of Cheerios with a yawn to drop cereal down into two separate bowls, their usual morning routine.

“What d’you want to do today?” Ian asks a while later, holding his bowl up to his mouth to get the last dregs of milk and cereal into his stomach. Mickey shrugs. It doesn’t really matter to him what they do, he just likes being here. Being with Ian.

Ian looks thoughtful, “Could go to the tracks”.

That was always a reliable activity to resort to. Mickey grins, “Sure”.

After getting dressed, they hurry out of the house before Fiona or Monica or anyone else can saddle them with looking after Carl or Debbie, and hop onto their bikes to ride down towards the El. Cruising in the early morning sunshine, Ian tries to do tricks on his bike the whole way there, rolling his green eyes when Mickey gets them right on the first try.

He can’t help but show off just a little, but he does do his best to relay how to do the tricks properly to his best friend, cheering when a proud Ian finally gets them right.

Once they arrive, they ditch their bikes on the ground and sit down in the sunshine-warmed pebbles beneath the El, dumped there ages ago for work that never actually got done. They talk about school and video games and lot of other stupid crap until the train starts to rumble in the distance, and then they get up with matching grins.

A handful of pebbles each, they peg the train cars relentlessly as they go roaring past above them, laughing even though they can’t hear anything besides the heavy train rocketing over steel. It’s a pointless, childish assault, but one they have enjoyed for years now.

When the train finally disappears, just a loud echo steadily growing quieter, Mickey looks over at his best friend, satisfaction and sunlight making Ian’s lightly freckled face glow. His red hair seems more illuminated too, and Mickey almost has to squint in the bright morning light to get a good look at him.

Days like this are his absolute favorite… when Ian turns to smile back at him, Mickey’s not sure if it’s the sunlight making him glow at all.

As always, he has to return home that evening, but he leaves his bike at Ian’s for safe-keeping. His dad sold his last one without asking, without a fucking word, for what Mickey never knew. Although he now has his suspicions. He never forgave him for that, and he rarely trusted bringing his “new” bike home again after that either. Not unless he could sneak it up to his room.

But with both parents home tonight, he has no such luck. After a practically silent meal at the dinner table of boiled from frozen potato perogies, Mickey cleans up after himself and heads for the bathroom. Of course, that should be moment of quiet solace gets ruined too.

“Mom!” Mandy shrieks, “Mickey’s trying to use our bathroom!”

Mickey groans.

“Shut up!” he hisses out at his younger sister, but it’s already too late. He hears his mother cursing all the way towards him, so he abandons the nicer and cleaner bathroom to retreat to the “boys” bathroom instead. More and more his mom was insisting the girls have their own, because him and his dad “didn’t give a shit about cleaning up after themselves”. Mickey didn’t have a choice, and it was useless arguing with either parent.

It never earned him anything but bruises.

Standing inside the damp and mildewy-smelling bathroom in defeat, he lowers his shorts to take a piss, but he glances over towards the corner cabinet holding the toilet papers rolls and other crap curiously. His Dad had the same stuff jammed in there for years… and he can’t help but get a gnawing feeling that he should test something.

The more Iggy and Lip talked about girls, the more the other boys at school did, the more he felt like something was wrong. Ian was the only one who didn’t seem to be like that.

After he pees, he crouches down to dig through the stack of magazines that’s been in here forever, until he finds the one he had seen left out before.

XXX Neighbors.

Glossy and suggestive, he knows what’s inside. He’d even opened it before, by accident. But that was two years ago. Biting the inside of his lip nervously, Mickey flips open the magazine, curious blue eyes roaming over the photos of the naked women inside.

He keeps thinking it will happen, that he’ll get hard like he’s supposed to, but he doesn’t. He focuses harder on the dark bushes between the girl’s legs, and their big fake boobs, but _nothing_ happens.

Frustrated, he keeps flipping until he finally feels a satisfying burn in his stomach that makes him stop dead, something in his brain saying, “ _That_!”

There’s a _guy_ in this photo, behind the woman. You can’t see his dick or anything, but he’s clearly naked.

Mickey’s heart pounds harder, and then it starts to happen. The tingling feeling. Like fire in his stomach. It’s exciting, but then its terrifying.

_What does this mean?_

He slaps the magazine shut and shoves it back into its hiding place.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This style of writing is a bit new for me, "sectioning" the character's life, so please excuse if its a bit awkward sometimes :) Sort of experimental for me.


End file.
